Tokyo arrest in hostess kidnap killing

The fast-living Japanese businessman suspected of the kidnap and dismemberment of hostess Lucie Blackman was formally arrested yesterday.

Police will ask prosecutors to file charges against Joji Obara, 48, seven weeks after finding the British woman's body in a seashore cave close to an apartment he owns, and nine months after she disappeared.

Detectives say Obara invited Blackman, 21, for lunch on July 1 last year at the apartment in Zushi, an hour's drive south of Tokyo, where she worked in bar. "He plied her with spiked drinks, then assaulted her after she lost consciousness," said Tadao Sugawara, chief of the capital's serious crimes division. "When she died of drug poisoning, he mutilated her body and abandoned it."

Obara has been in jail since last October, facing trial for drugging and raping five other women, including a Canadian and an Australian hostess.

Unusually for Japan, where most suspects confess, Obara has denied these charges, and he has refused to discuss Blackman's case.

Police acknowledge they are relying on circumstantial evidence; according to local reports, detectives have traced Blackman's last call to a phone owned by Obara.

During a search of his apartment, investigators reportedly found a strand of her hair, sedatives, a photo of the victim on the day she disappeared, and videos of him raping more than 50 foreign women.

Blackman's family were informed from Japan of the arrest. Tim Blackman, who brought his daughter's remains home for burial last week, commended the police, but said the family would not attend the trial. "Many people at Lucie's funeral spoke of the chapter being closed, and for us that is very much the case."